Our first game did seem to be somewhat random as we were still feeling out what to do. However, we did learn quite a few things, and this made game two much more strategic.

Here are a few things that we found out.

1) The game is about chaos and minimizing negative effects. Chaos can be mitigated through strategy, and there are subtle ways of doing so. If you do not control how much chaos you are dealing with, your game will be completely random from turn to turn.

2) Locker items are not as good as they appear. They keep you from buying a girl and that adds chaos to your turn. Having the girl in your purchase area gives you 20% control of the situation and also allows you to chose if you want to go faculty favorable or girl favorable purchasing for the next turn. Also, you will get punished for having locker items by faculty and by other player sending their pets and negative effects your way.

3) Be careful what faculty you put into your opponent's pile. The resources or lack thereof will strongly affect what they buy on their turn.

4) Single apple value faculty are neigh useless early on. Given the choice of weak faculty or a girl, go with the girl. Substitutes will produce little resource and clog up their deck later, hopefully appearing as pet teachers later. As decks get clogged, the 1 apples become much more powerful.

5) Don't bother with the janitor until decks are clogged. All but one starting girl can defeat him, so unless you really like 10% odds, or it is the second turn and Keziah Mason has still not popped up in the player to your left's discard pile, don't bother.

No matter what, this game has a lot of chaos thrown in. You cannot make hard plans. However, you can have a direction in your play. You can build your deck to generate horror or friendship, and this will affect your deck. Friendship seems to be better early off as you go for a deck with more endurance. However, horror can punish your opponent, and makes sense if you can get your hands on officer Dagon, Pickman, Wills and Tracofyith.

I rather enjoyed this game, but I like games where you spend most of your time without having the amount of resource that you desire, and constantly fighting fires. I did not feel like the game was playing itself and I was along for the ride, rather that I was trying to make the best out of a constantly changing environment (and actually making meaningful decisions).

Thanks for the review! I've been on the fence about this one. The theme, artwork, and twist on a favorite mechanic all speak to me. However, how it plays does trump all of that in my opinion, and what I've heard so far has not really convinced my to fall on either side of the fence just yet.

Your speaking of the "chaos" in this game answers some misgivings I've had when I hear that this game is just random luck of the draw with no strategy. I think if the strategy is subtle and hidden under this "chaos", then I can see how some people might think there is no strategy and all decisions can be mapped out in a simple flow chart.

This review has given me that little push to getting this game and trying it out for myself. Some of the games I love are heavy on in-your-face strategy, so a game that uses subtle strategy hidden in chaos, sounds like a challenging diversion to me.

This is not a game for everyone, and there will be times that forces conspire against you, and that you will be powerless to do much about it.

So, there is luck, and there are times when you cannot do anything but take a beating. Those times, you will have to suffer through. Still, the edge will go to the player who makes the best of what he has in those times when he has a level of control of the situation.

This is not a pure strategy game. There will be games that no matter what you do, or how well you played, that you will still lose, but I think that good play will have you win more often than those who do not play a smart game. Hopefully, after I get a lot more games under my belt, I will see a trend of what players and what strategies win most often.

The events are pretty wild and unpredictable. Some of them may be a bit too random. I do like that they clear their respective stacks.

In a 2-player game, I think that events could really break the game. Actually, I don't think that this game would be much fun for two players.

I just don't think that locker items are that big of a deal as long as players are playing smart and not just choosing faculty at a whim. There are faculty that destroy locker items, and ones that punish you for having locker items.